Love in Packaging
by Irrevocable Truth
Summary: Sometimes, the best birthday love letters don't have words.


**Dedicated to: **aNimeLover-chAn05 (Belated happy birthday!)

**A/N**: I made this quite some time ago (a few months, perhaps?), I hope you story is rather cliché, I know. The whole I-need-to-buy-a-gift-for-my-loved-one ordeal. But still. I added something to it. I'm not sure if it will make the story better or not, but hopefully it will at least make the story unique. And I know Natsume's birthday isn't until far off, but yeah. XD

**=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=**

I stared at the .._thing_ in my hands.

"W-what's that, Mikan-chan?" Iinchou asked cautiously.

My left eye twitched involuntarily.

A brave finger from Anna poked it.

It crumbled even more.

"I—I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..." I tuned out the rest of Anna's apology.

In my hands was a failed attempt at baking cookies. They were black, and they had chocolate chips here and there, and it was squishy, but it fell apart easily.

I sighed and placed the cookie alongside all of my other failures. It is proven—I am a horrible cook.

In the pile of failures was a cake that turned out so very much wrong. Let's not even talk about it anymore. There was also an attempt at omelettes—Nonoko had assured me that it was very fairly easy to do—but that turned out like something that was chewed, swallowed, and puked out with other stomach contents. And for some reason, it turned out purplish.

"I give up!" I wailed, messing up my hair in frustration.

"Face it; you're not fit to be a cook," Hotaru said flatly, swallowing the crab brains she was eating.

She'd been sitting there, watching me fail, alongside my other friends, minus Ruka and Natsume, for about 3 ½ hours now. How they can stand me failing over and over again, I do not know. Perhaps they find my misery amusing. Yes. That must be it.

How did I end up cooking miserable food—if you can even call it that?

Well, see, let's rewind.

**=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=**

Natsume and I were out on a date in Central Town.

Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you, didn't I? Well, me and Natsume are kinda.. uh.. together now.

You get my drift, right?

So, anyway, proceeding.

We were eating in this fancy restaurant. The one second to the right of the pawnshop. Yeah, that one with the golden curtains and chandeliers.

And don't get me started on the prices. Have you ever tried drinking iced water that costs 50 rabbits a glass? They claim it has "recuperating powers" or whatnot. But I don't get it. _What does recuperating even mean?_ But anyway, it tastes the same as regular water, so I tried my best to make one glass last until the end of the meal.

Natsume noticed this, apparently, and just smirked.

So, we were talking about stuff. Well, technically I was talking, and he was just making facial expressions based on what I said, but that's how we talk, so deal with it.

And then I asked him what his favourite food was.

He pondered about it for a while, then replied with this really mischievous smirk, "Anything you cook would be my favourite."

I flushed at this.

Alright, so we'd been together for about 7 months now, but I still got butterflies in my stomach whenever he said something even remotely sweet, and my knees still went weak at the slightest physical contact.

So, now that his birthday is fast approaching [it's in two days], I decided that I'd try cooking something for him.

But alas, my cooking skills are nada. Zero**. Zilch.**

Reluctantly, I removed the apron I was wearing and hung it on the hook behind the door of the Home Economics room. It was a new room, and I sort of feel bad about using it and making a huge mess.

"Well, I'll look for something else to give him instead, so I'll be going now," I said, waving a quick goodbye to my peers.

**=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=**

And so started the quest for buying something worthy to give to_ the_ Natsume Hyuuga.

I had pondered about it for countless of hours.

And what I came up with, was this: _Nothing._

So I decided to go to Central Town, and browse through their endless shops and stocks (Trust me, it **is **endless. I never quite got to see all of the shops, no matter how much I try to finish looking through all of them. Must be magic. Or an alice. I don't know.), hoping for some sudden burst of an idea when I see something that catches my eye.

After 46 minutes of walking around, my feet protested against walking any 5 steps further, and my dry throat was in compliance. I had spotted what looked like a cheap shop where I could hopefully buy something to help quench my thirst. I arrived there, and drawled out an order of a glass of iced water. I must have really looked exhausted, because the waitress was staring at me like a homeless bum had just entered—even though that certainly wasn't the case since I WAS wearing my school uniform.

She returned after five (Five? It seemed like eternity) minutes with my glass of water. I paid her accordingly, and cursed myself at the realization that I had just lost 5 rabbits of my spending money for Natsume's gift.

I took a sip out of my glass and turned to look out the window. And then I saw it.

It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life.

It was a red box, perfectly wrapped with a purple velvet ribbon to top it off, and it was HUGE. Inside, the salesman announced, was howalon.

My favourite candy. My sweet spot. My most favourite of all favourites. My dream come true. My melting point. The center of my dreams when Natsume wasn't.

I drooled, and before I knew it my feet had dragged me by itself to stand agape at the huge box.

It was only until a little 5-year-old boy pointed to me and whispered something like 'Mommy, is that girl a zwombie?' to his mother that I snapped out of my reverie. The boy was initially shocked. Perhaps he thought he got me mad and I was out to swear my revenge on him and haunt him for the rest of his days.

I asked the salesman how much it was worth. He replied, with that bright entrepreneur smile, that they were having a promo and it would only be worth 100 rabbits. I looked in my wallet. 108 rabbits.

I hesitated. If I bought this, there would only be 8 rabbits left for Natsume's gift. What the hell could I be buying with that?

Oh, the agony of the situation. What was I supposed to do? It was there, see? So undeniably **huge. **It was a year's worth of howalon, from my estimation. I was tempted to buy it. So tempted.

But Natsume's present...

I shook all thoughts of buying the gigantic box away, and willed myself to turn around and return in my quest for gift-shopping. I could always buy one later. Yes, later.

I walked off, content with my decision, into the opposite direction of the few boxes of howalon for sale.

"One box left! Buy it now. We're never having this again, ladies and gentlemen. We'll even give you a 5% discount," I heard the businessman shout.

I whipped my head to turn it in their direction, and true to his words, there was only one left.

It was howalon or Natsume's gift.

**=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=X=**

I smiled happily, clutching my gift-wrapped present closer to me. I worked hard last night to wrap it perfectly. I refused to seek help from Hotaru and insisted I do it myself. I think the outcome of 13 tries wasn't so bad. Sure the ribbon was a little crooked and I could see the tape that I had used, but in my opinion it didn't look half-bad.

I'm glad of the decision I made that day in Central Town with the howalon. If I didn't make that decision, I probably wouldn't ever have been able to get Natsume my gift. I think it's a pretty good gift, if I may say so myself. Took me a while before I finally decided what to get him, but in the end, I think all is good.

Yes, all is good. Definitely.

"Hi Natsume," I greeted him as I sat down beside him and placed the box beside me.

Noticing the gift, he smirked again, then said, "Bought a gift for me, little girl?"

I nodded, took the box in my hands again, then handed it to him. "Happy birthday, Natsume Hyuuga."

I kissed him on the cheek along with this.

Maybe it was just me, but from my perspective, his cheeks turned just the littlest bit redder.

"Thanks," I heard him murmur.

I smiled instinctively –this was what Natsume was able to do to me. It makes me wonder just how much he can manipulate me if he wanted to if he already can when he's not even trying.

He opened the box, and my reflex reaction was to hide somewhere for fear he might not like it.

But I didn't, because that would be extremely rude. So I stayed fixed to where I was as I waited for him to open the gift.

"Dental floss?" He smirked. "My teeth not perfect enough for you?"

I blushed, and bent my head down. I knew it. He wouldn't like it. He wouldn't. He wouldn't. He...

"And a pencil. Really now." He spared me a glance, and I felt like my cheeks were just about ready to overheat and detach themselves from my face. "And an eraser-less one at that."

He doesn't. He doesn't. Oh my god, he doesn't.

He looked at me, a small curve of a smile grazing his lips, as he said, "Care to explain why you chose these?"

I stared and blinked for a while.

"I mean, you're not the type not to put effort into a gift. At least not from how I know you. So I'm guessing even if these are really pitiful things I could buy just anywhere, you have a special meaning for them. Right?" he added with a smug expression, as if he could see right through me and my intentions.

And, well, he was sort of right.

"Dental floss," I started out as a whisper. Partly because how he knew me still awed me, and partly because I was reconsidering whether the gift I gave was any good at all. "Because."

I looked up at him, and into the eyes that I have grown to love. "I always, always want to see you smiling at your best."

He smirked, and so I blushed –for the _n_th time. This was becoming too much of a habit, it seems.

"And the eraser-less pencil?" he prodded.

"Because I wanted to show you how people make mistakes. Even you, the _almighty Natsume Hyuuga_, makes mistakes. So the eraser-less pencil is to show you that. You write your life. And sometimes you need to make erasures, but you're prevented from that. Because the eraser doesn't come with the pack."

I reached into my pocket, and I saw his eyes follow my hand. I took out a pencil of my own, identical to his.

"And I write my life, too. And I make mistakes, too. We all do. But I was hoping maybe we could make our mistakes together."

I smiled, surprised at how cheesy this all was.

And he smiled back, the small smile that I understood so well.

Then he kissed me, like that kiss all clichéd love stories have in the end.


End file.
